50th Day of School

Hi everybody!  I wanted to tell you about a really cool day we had at my school.  We celebrated the 50th day of school.  Ok, I know, you're probably thinking "50th day of school?  Most people celebrate the 100th day of school."  I've celebrated the 50th day for the last two years and found that it's really helped my children understand the higher numbers in more depth.  I think that counting by fives and tens really is the basis for so many skills that our students need for mathematical concepts later in life.  It's really essential that we give them a firm foundation in kindergarten.

I dressed as a 1950's girl!  I got the costume from a Party Store right before Halloween, and I danced to a swing song by Elvis Presley with my husband.  We discussed how life was different in the 1950's (sock hops, soda shops, how people dressed) and even made root bear floats with our kiddos!  Here is a great video that we showed.  Thanks Stephanie for bringing it to my attention!

My class has also been learning about sorting and classifying, so I combined sorting with grouping by tens by using Fruit Loops to count to 50.  I used the following paper, laminated, and the children placed the Fruit Loops on top of the appropriate colors.  The great thing about laminating the sheet is you can use it year after year.  In the past, I've had them paste the Fruit Loops onto the sheet using marshmallow fluff, but I think that method is just too much sugar.  It's healthier with just the cereal.

50 Fruit Loops by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

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I also made the following 50's chart where the children can trace the dotted font to help them understand how to make the numbers.  My students are constantly making numbers backwards.  I know that this is age appropriate for kindergarten, but my county does expect them, on standardized tests, to be able to write the numbers.

50s Chart by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

Two super songs that I found on Songs for Teaching are:

"Rockin' to 50" by MMMKids
"The Counting Creatures" by Ron Brown

I had the children hold up a plastic hundreds chart, but of course we only used numbers 1 to 50 so that they could see the numbers as we sang the songs.

One project that I loved doing when I was a girl scout (many, many years ago) was making paper chains.  I have several kids with fine motor problems this year, and I thought it would be oh-so-nifty to combine counting to 50 with patterning and the fine motor practice.  My blue and green tables, for example, used blue and green strips.  Each table made their own chain and we hung them up in the hallway along with the 50th day of school projects that my kids made.

Now my kids are super excited about doing the days in school chart that we've been using, and they can't wait for the 100th day!  I think I'm going to do this every year now.  It was so much fun!  Do you do anything special for the 50th day of school?  I'd love to hear about it.  Write a comment below.

Dice Number Freebies

I hope you all had a wonderful Valentine's Day!  I'm going to Washington, DC tonight, to a wonderful chocolate-specialty restaurant called Co Co Sala.  I've never been there before, so wish me luck!  I hope it's delicious.

I wanted to share with you that my children were having a little trouble with addition.  Alright, to tell the truth they were having a LOT of trouble with addition.  So, I reflected on my teaching and thought I needed something a little more motivating than what I was doing.  I start off my math lesson with a little bit of calendar, then I do a math message on the whiteboard where I talk about what we're going to learn for that day.  Then I give the children a problem to solve together.  That always works fine, because the kids turn-and-talk and my smarties always help the kids who are really confused.  I made a slideshow for the computer, for addition, using dice.  I thought this way the kids could count the pips and also see the numbers.  On one slide they have to guess the answer, and I don't tell them whether they're right or not until they see the following slide with the answer.  I also had kids explain why they thought the answer was right or wrong.  This was done whole group.

Addition Dice Slideshow by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

Then I had my class divided into three groups: centers, table work with dice, and a group with me with large, foam dice.  Some of my group still need practice writing their numerals.   I mean, I get papers back where the number is upside down, backwards, etc.  I also use manipulatives to show the different equations when they're working with me.  When they're at their seats, each child has two dice and these papers:

Addition Picture Groups Dice by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

I also placed this mini poster on their desk to help them write their numerals when they're not with me.

Addition Dice Poster by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley


Enjoy these freebies, and let me know if this works for you.

Bear Addition

Happy New Year, everyone!  I am so sorry that I've been slacking on my blog.  I went to visit relatives in New York over the holidays and read lots of books.  Is anyone else experiencing really cold temperatures?  It's going to be in the teens tomorrow.  I can't believe that Maryland is having these temperatures!

Over the long break, I tried to think of really cool products I could make to match manipulatives that I already have in my classroom.  So I thought, why not do addition cards that would match the little plastic bears that we all have in our classrooms?  Here is a freebie, if you'd like to test it with your kids, to see how it works:

Addition Equations With Bear Pictures by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

On TPT I'm selling all the different combinations up to 10, including missing addends and sums.  The reason I made this is so that the children could use them with me in small group or in math center independently.  The bears are to scale so that the children can place the bears right on top of the cards.

Some really cool songs for addition are "Addition Pokey" by Dr. Jean, "Doubles" by Mr. Al, and "Butterfly Addition" by Miss Jenny.

Song Poster Doubles by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

Also here are some addition videos put together by Harry Kindergarten:

Addition
Add 'em Up

A really great book to integrate reading and math is Monster Math: Picnic.  The thing I like about this book is that it shows different combinations to 10 in descending order: 10+0, 9+1, 8+2, etc.  The pictures in the story have a lot of kid appeal.  I've noticed lately that my kids are a lot more into monsters than they've ever been in the past.  Maybe that's because their parents are watching a lot of vampire and zombie shows.  I don't really know!  Why do you think the kids like monsters so much?

Numbers 1 to 20

It's hard to keep my mind focused on academics when I'm worried about Christmas shopping and how we're getting to Syracuse this year to see the family, but I think I came up with some really cute stuff.

First of all, I love starting off math lessons with great literature.  The carousel at the top of this post shows my favorite number 1 to 20 books.  Research does show that children pick up more vocabulary when they are read to than during any other method.  I also truly believe in making math as fun as possible by incorporating games and music.  I found these really cool dice at EAI Education.  They are just so useful and versatile.  I think they're one of those "must-have" items for making math fun.  I couldn't believe how long my children wanted to play the game More and Less.  It's really like the card game War, but with each child having a die.  They just decide ahead of time whether they win by rolling more or less.  I pulled them in a group of 8 while a second group was in centers and a third group was doing a number book, and seriously, the game played itself.  They were very cooperative and into rolling and identifying numbers.  I also had bear counters there in case they weren't sure who had more or less.

Here is a freebie of what the children were doing at their seats while I was playing the dice game with my group, as well as another book that I'll be using next week while I play 1 to 20 Bingo with kids.  I just remade this Bingo game to focus on numbers 0 to 20, to go with Common Core, instead of my old Bingo that was 1 to 31.  I like this new version better because I have snowflakes in ten frames along with the numeral, so that the children can count to find out what the number is if they don't know the numeral says.

11 to 20 Winter Number Books

Harry Kindergarten has some great songs for 1 to 20.  I wonder if he knows how much he's appreciated.

Count To 20

Numbers in the Teens

Also, I found this really adorable video by Kids Classroom.  The video shows number balls rolling into place in a very easy-to-understand, sequential manner.

Number Rhymes for Kids

I'm really getting into these videos because the kids can see it, hear it, and dance at the same time.

Carolyn Kisloski just gave me the idea for a number fishing game that I'm going to start making today.  If you haven't checked out Carolyn's blog, you're missing out on some fabulous ideas.  Thanks, Carolyn!  You're the best!

I would love to hear what number games you're playing with your kids.  Please leave a comment below.

Spectacular Sorting Ideas & Freebies

Boy, I am tired today!  I feel like I've run a marathon.  Well, I did go to my school's Halloween dance on Thursday and all of my little kinders wanted to dance with me.  So I guess that's similar to a marathon.

We started a new unit in math this week: sorting and classifying.  I feel that I'm teaching this unit very concisely.  The books from the carousel above really helped to bring home rules about sorting and classifying.  In the past, when I've asked my students what sorting was, they've told me "You know.  You put the red ones with the red ones.  You put the yellow ones with the yellow ones."  This year, when I ask them what sorting is, they're telling me that you can put similar things in a group.  Yes!  Why am I so excited?  Well, on our mandatory quarter test the students have to be able to look at a group of objects and know how to sort them by the sorting rule.  They also have to sort and then tell which group has more objects and which has fewer objects.  I made this paper specifically for that purpose.

Color Graph Rabbit.pdf by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

Another reason I made this paper was that a friend bought me these sorting rabbits for Christmas.

Sorting Bunnies with Hat from Learning Resources

There is something so magical about pulling rabbits out of a hat.  Ok, maybe it's just me, but I love unique manipulatives.  Some people collect shoes, some people collect purses.  I collect all types of unusual math manipulatives.

I found a video on the internet about sorting and classifying that's just so cute!  I love the woman's Indian accent.

Sorting and classifying songs are hard to find, but I spent a while researching and I found these and bought them from iTunes:

"Socks in the Dryer - Sorting" by Jeff Johnson
"Sorting Socks (Sorting by Attribute)" by Judy and David
"The Sorting Song" by Heidi Butkus

In years past, I've used:

"Make a Group" by Jack Hartmann
"Color, Shape & Size" by Jack Hartmann

If you know of more sorting songs, please tell me about them in a comment!

This week I also sorted by size with bear manipulatives and plastic pumpkins that I found in a variety of places.  I have a freebie on TPT for coloring pumpkins by size.  And here is an apple size sorting paper:

Apple Color By Size.pdf by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

I'd love to hear about what all of you are doing for sorting and classifying this year!  If you can, leave a comment below.

Counting Core Comparing Numbers

I'm not sure if there's a place that any of you know of to find mathematical concept books.  Since I didn't know of one I researched many number books and found these to be more specifically about comparing.  The Common Core standards that I'm doing right now are:

K.CC.6:  Identify whether the number of objects in one group is greater than, less than, or equal to the number of objects in another group, e.g., by using matching and counting strategies.

K.CC.7:  Compare two numbers between 1 and 10 presented as written numerals.

If your children already know numbers 1 to 12, I found that giving a pair of students twelve-sided dice really helps them to discuss which number is more and which number is less.  Tip: If your students don't know numbers, it's better to give them cards where they can count groups of objects.  I made this ten-frame comparing book that works really nicely to clear up any misconceptions about more and less, and to show them how to represent numbers in several different ways.  I hope you enjoy this freebie!

Comparing Numbers With Ten Frames by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

I also went looking on the internet for helpful videos and found these:

There's a really cute song by Miss Jenny called "Alligator Greater/Less", from the album "We Love Math".  It matches perfectly with the concept of more and less.

Finally, I really enjoy using technology in my classroom and these web sites are free and easy for kindergartners to use:

http://www.primarygames.com/math/fishycount
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ur9f7N7Hlr0
http://www.factmonster.com/math/knowledgebox/ player.html?movie=sfw42183
http://illuminations.nctm.org/ActivityDetail.aspx?ID=75
http://illuminations.nctm.org/ActivityDetail.aspx?ID=73

Let me know what you think!

Super Shapes with Freebie

I can't believe it's been weeks since my last blog post!  The beginning of school this year was a little hectic.  You see, our school was switching over from carpet flooring to tiles, and the classrooms were not quite ready the week that we went back.  I have to say I actually had chest pains worrying about getting my classroom done in time for our kindergarten orientation.  Seriously!  Am I obsessive-compulsive or what?

So anyway, Monday is going to be my 14th day of school, and I wanted to share with you all some things that really worked thus far.  We started off the year with positions and shapes.  The books in the carousel above are some of my favorite shape books ever.  I have previously blogged about two of the books, Mouse Shapes and Grandfather Tang's Story. 

Four songs that worked really well for me this year, where the students can practice drawing the shapes in the air while they're learning about them, are:

"Waltz of the Triangles" by Newbridge Education

"I'm a Circle" by Jack Hartmann

"I'm a Square" by Jack Hartmann

"Circles" by Miss Jenny

I really listened to my students this year talking about what they like.  Robots seemed to be something that they were interested in.  Also, my class is very boy-heavy.  So, taking that into consideration, I cut out shapes and had the students create their own shape robots.  You would not believe the creativity!  The children were saying their robots were space aliens, vampire robots (I have no idea!), Barbie robots, and princess robots.  I really thought this was a great project to do at the beginning of the year, because it really got my ESOL students talking to each other about their shapes, what they were creating, etc.  I was also able to find out who could say the names of the shapes that their robots were made out of.  Here are two examples of the robots that they made:

I just gave each student a Ziploc bag of a variety of shapes.  Another teacher in my school just put the shapes on the table without giving each child a bag.  The one tip that I have for you is to keep the activity to the four basic shapes (circle, square, rectangle, triangle) because you can still make a great person-like creature with them.  The Common Core State Standard for this project was:

CCSS.Math.Content.K.G.B.6:  Compose simple shapes to form larger shapes. For example, “Can you join these two triangles with full sides touching to make a rectangle?”

Finally, here is a freebie that you can use along with this robot project, to make a connection to reading:

Robot Action Book by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

I hope you like this freebie and can use it with your kiddos.  I'd love to know what you're doing for shape projects!

Capturing Calendar

My Kindergarten Calendar Kit

Hello all!  I was away at a gaming convention for a week, and it really inspired me to start working on my children's comic book game.  Well, after having a week's vacation I had to come back to my favorite pastime: stalking blogs.  I was really excited to see that Castles and Crayons was doing a Schedule Spotlight Series #2 - Calendar Linky Party.

I do not do my calendar first thing in the morning.  I have my calendar at the beginning of math time, which is usually later in the day.  Since my kiddos get a little tired in the second part of the day, I try to do a lot of movement songs during calendar.  I usually start with a song by Jack Hartmann off the CD "Rhythms and Rhymes for Special Times".  This CD has a different song for each month of the school year, focusing on holidays during that month and special things you see, hear and do.  I love using this CD because it keeps things new and fresh, and it really gives the students some information about each month in the year.  My kids also really enjoy Jack Hartmann's song "Today, Yesterday and Tomorrow".  I have the kids use hand gestures, as well as feet and head, to show "today" (feet together), "yesterday" (left foot and left hand out, and look to the left), and "tomorrow" (right foot and right hand out, and look to the right).

I also have the calendar helper move the card to the correct spot and use a pointer to show the right spaces. The calendar person usually switches every week, along with the rest of my jobs.  I also have somebody working the CD player, which I started this year, and actually the students are really great with  it.  They only need to know two buttons: play and stop.  I usually have them stop the songs to ask pertinent questions such as "What numbers are the 'neighbors' of today's date?", "Is 19 larger or smaller than 10?", and "How many 1's are in that number? How many 10's?".

No calendar time would be complete without doing Dr. Jean's "Macarena Months" song.  With the new Common Core standards focusing more on writing, I added a song where the students air-write the numbers, called "Chant and Write", also by Dr. Jean.  I've also noticed that so many kindergarten students write their numbers backwards, so this song really helps them to see it, hear it, and feel it.

I'm looking forward to hearing what other people do for their calendar time.  By the way, is anyone else working summer school this summer?  I am so excited to be going back in July!

Integrating Spring

"Hopper Hunts for Spring" Book Cover

I'd like to start by thanking Linda at Primary Inspiration for hosting her Primary Math Linky Party.  What a terrific idea!  My contribution to the linky party is this integrated post featuring several freebies including addition bunnies.

I love using the book Hopper Hunts for Spring because it can tie in math, science, language arts, and writing all in one beautiful spring package.  The story itself focuses on a young bunny's confusion about who "Spring" is.  I think this book is fabulous for starting discussions with your class about the spring season.  I try really hard to encourage higher-level thinking by asking open-ended questions such as "What do you think Hopper is thinking?", "What kinds of things do you like to do in the spring?", and "What would you see, hear, smell, and taste in the spring if you were a bunny?".

For writing and art, I'm going to have my students use these differentiated spring cut-up sentences that they can also illustrate.

Spring Sentence Worksheets With Drawing by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

I've taken a few classes this year that say it's really important to use sentence starters for ESOL children.  Since my class is almost entirely ESOL, I've really embraced sentence starters throughout this school year.  Here is an example of one of them, with a picture word bank.

Spring Writing Prompt by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley


Even though Common Core has taken time and money out of kindergarten, I still think that a short calendar time is important.  I still use my calendar and I use different songs to represent special times of the year.  Some songs that I will use in April are:

"Five Little Bunnies" by Mar Harmon
"5 Little Bunnies" by Joanie Calem
"Celebrate the Spring" by Jack Hartmann
"It's Spring" by Tiana

I feel that my children focus much better when we sing and dance to bring us all together on the carpet and to transition between subjects.  I think all four of these songs give details about spring that some five-year-olds aren't yet familiar with.  They also provide a nice baseline to make connections between the book, what they're writing about, and what they're hearing.  The bunny songs are nice fingerplays for those students who still don't have one-to-one correspondence - I still have two in my kindergarten class who are having trouble with this.  It's still good for the other children in my class because they can focus on the rhyming parts of the song.

I'm going to cut up these addition bunnies, laminate them, and put them in my math center for further practice.  My children are going to use manipulatives of their choice from the center to check their answers.

Addition Bunnies by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

Please let me know which ideas you like from this post.  Your feedback really helps me to decide what to write about next.

Cupcake Freebies and More

Book Cover of "If You Give a Cat a Cupcake"

I don't know about you, but I think books by Laura Numeroff really work for teaching cause and effect.  I found some great ideas for the book If You Give a Cat a Cupcake on the Mouse Cookie Books web site.  There's a really nice activity kit that includes a dot-to-dot paper, and matching pictures to words, fun games for the kids to play, and more.  I've been watching "Cupcake Wars" on TV lately, and it's really affected my choices of things to make for my class.  When I realized this, I thought "Why not blog about it?"

So, I'm going to start off tomorrow by giving my children this warm-up where they have to color each cupcake based on the color word:

Coloring Cupcakes by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

During morning message, I will ask the students to do a turn-and-talk and describe their favorite cupcake: what it looks like, smells like, and tastes like.  I will also sing "Do You Know the Cupcake Man?", sung to the tune of "Do You Know the Muffin Man?".  ;-)  And instead of saying "Mulberry Street" at the end, you can say the street that your school is on.

I'm going to use this guided reading book when I pull the kids, to teach more sight words.  I wish that I could have them decorate the cupcake like I've done in years past, but we're not allowed to use food in the classroom this year.  :-(  I will have them also make-and-break the word "will" with magnet letters (that's our new sight word this week) on magnetic white boards.

My Cupcake Face Book by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

When they work at their tables, I'm going to have them do this follow-up sight word coloring paper:

Sight Word Coloring Cupcakes by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

If you like this sight word paper, I sell a package of these on TPT that you might want to check out.

In math, we're doing addition right now.  To really grab my students' attention I'm going to use plastic cupcakes that I bought in a bakery set to model what I want them to do, and then I will give them this cupcake addition paper to check for understanding:

Addition With Cupcakes by Sharon A Blachowicz Dudley

Lastly, I'm going to put a cupcake tin with some Play Doh, along with some plastic candles, in math center so that they can practice counting by ones and skip counting by twos.  So if they're skip counting by twos, they would put two candles in each cupcake.

I hope you enjoy these cupcake freebies, let me know what you think.  I love hearing from all of you!

Comparing Numbers and Amounts

"Five Creatures" by Emily Jenkins

I recently did a math lesson for my principal to observe, based on the following three goals.

1. The students will compare two numbers using sets and 1:1 correspondence, and be able to explain and express the relationship verbally, through pictures, and in writing.
2. The students will analyze a number line to find out if written numerals are in correct sequential order.
3. The students will use deductive reasoning as they problem-solve scenarios in books related to "more" and "less".

The first two goals were specifically math content goals.  The third one was a literature goal integrating the math concept.

During language arts, we read the book Five Creatures by Emily Jenkins.  This was a great book for several reasons.  It lent itself really well to using the vocabulary words "more" and "fewer".  For example, on one page it said that there were three humans and two cats.  So I would ask the students "Were there more humans or more cats?"  On another page, it said four of them liked fish and one did not, so I asked "Did fewer of the creatures like fish, or more?"

I started off the math lesson by having the children look at the Visualizer, which had number lines that were each incorrect in some way.  The students had to turn-and-talk and figure out what was wrong with the number line, and then we discussed their ideas.  This worked really well.  Here are the number lines that I used.

Number Lines Missing

One of the next things we did was to use this "Number of the Day" poster to practice writing our numerals:

"Number of the Day" poster

We all wrote the numbers with dry erase markers on individual whiteboards as the "Number of the Day" student wrote them on the poster.  That way, the children had a model to go by.

Since Common Core focuses much more on numbers, I think it's important that my students know how to identify numerals, count, match quantities, and understand how amounts look on ten frames.  Our county's module assessments also incorporate ten frames, so I made these books to help the children have a frame of reference so that when they saw the question on the test, they wouldn't be confused.

My Ten Frame Book 2

My Ten Frame Book 3

For differentiation purposes, I made two levels of books.  I used the first book with my lower students who still need to match numerals with amounts.  The second book was used with my students who do understand matching numerals with amounts and are now ready to compare numbers.

We also played a game with large flip-circles (yellow and red) on a giant ten frame mat.

Single Ten Frame

Double Ten Frame

I used the back of a Twister mat to make the ten frames sturdy and durable enough for the children to crawl on.  This game can be played in several different ways, depending on the level of your students.  I had children place flip-circles on the ten frame with some red-face-up and some yellow-face-up.  Then they had to tell me which color had more, which color had less, and how they knew that.  For a variation, we played "Are there more squares empty or are there more squares filled?"  That was a little tougher.  We've also started doing addition with problems such as "If you have five red flip-circles and you want ten, how many yellow flip-circles have to go on the board?"  This game is mostly for my high group, which is composed of eight kindergarten kids.

I found a real treasure at Really Good Stuff.  They're ten-frame dry-erase boards that are magnetic, and you can purchase flip-circles that are also magnetic.  I think these are fab for any pre-k, k, or 1st grade classroom.

Magnetic Ten Frame Boards from Really Good Stuff

Please let me know what you are doing to compare numbers.  I'd love to hear what you think of these ideas. Also if you have any questions, please feel free to ask them in a comment.

Quick and Easy Math Idea

"6 Sticks" by Molly Coxe

Things have been pretty hectic lately, but I wanted to share with all of you a very easy activity that my students really got into.  We were focusing on the number 6 today (part of the new Common Core curriculum that really digs deeper into numbers).  We wrote the number 6, made 6 tally marks, drew a picture of 6 things, sang Dr. Jean's song "Chant and Write", and read a great book called 6 Sticks by Molly Coxe.  The book basically shows 6 sticks arranged in many different configurations to produce a variety of designs.  I was going to have the children glue popsicle sticks onto a sheet of paper, but I decided to just let them manipulate the sticks on their tables to make whatever designs they wanted.  This worked really well, because the children got to make their design, break it apart, and make another design.  I was able to walk around and talk to each student about what they made.  How many times do we get to do that?  By the way, I have 25 students, and some of them don't speak any English.

Since our county's math test (which will be given in about a week and a half) has the children writing numerals, I made this book to help the children understand quantity and how to draw the number:

My Number Writing Book

If you like this book, please leave me a comment below!  It's always wonderful to hear from you.

First Week Back in Kindergarten

Pete the Cat: I Love My White Shoes

Hello bloggy friends!  I'm sorry that I haven't done a post for a week.  I've just been exhausted every day!  My class is really wonderful; I actually had 14 of them in pre-k last year.  So the funny thing is, whenever they tell me they don't know something, I say "I know your teacher taught you that, and you do know it."  And they say "Wait a minute... You were my teacher!"  And then I just smile.

So, to the heart of the matter: things that really worked this week.  Over the summer, I discovered the Pete the Cat books (thanks to my good friend, Lauren, who is also on my team).  We read I Love My White Shoes, Rocking In My School Shoes, and His Four Groovy Buttons.  My kids sat SO wonderfully for all three of these stories.  They were actively listening, they were engaged, and they were able to answer comprehension questions about them (and this is a feat, because I have some children who don't speak any English).  I made this paper to go along with the White Shoes book, and my students did such a great job that their papers are now hanging on my Thinking Board.

Pete the Cat Worksheet

We did some shape collages that worked really well.  My family helped me cut out many different circles, triangles, squares and rectangles out of a variety of scrapbooking paper.  Then the children had to find one particular shape each day and glue examples of it inside one large corresponding shape.

One thing that was challenging for me this year but did work nicely was the opening of math time.  In previous years I had made calendar CD's that focused on the day of the week, the month, spelling the days of the week, etc.  Since time has been taken out of the core curriculum, I felt that I really needed to change my focus for the beginning of math.  So we very briefly work with the calendar, simply focusing on today's date and singing "Today, Yesterday and Tomorrow" by Jack Hartmann.  Then we say the numbers up to that date (if it's August 24th, we count up to 24).  Next we do a number line activity (I purchased a number line from Lakeshore).  At this point, I'm just asking various students to find particular numbers.  Later in the year we'll jump ahead 2, go back 1, etc.  There's a fabulous song by Dr. Jean called "Country Countdown 1-20" that I use right after the number line to have the children bend their legs to each number as we count forwards to and backwards from 20.

I'd love to hear what things worked for you this week!  Please write me a comment below.

Rockin' Resources Linky Party

Kelly Dolling over at Teacher Idea Factory is having a great Rockin' Resources Linky Party, and this is so timely for me because I just got back from a week-long Lego Education conference in Kansas City!  I have used Duplo and Lego products in my classroom for years.  I love the way the kids are so motivated and excited to learn math, science, language and social skills that are essential in kindergarten and in pre-k.  At the convention I found out that they make many great products that I never heard about.

1. Duplo Early Simple Machines

Duplo Early Simple Machines

I feel that science should not just be something that is talked about, but that the children should have their hands on the materials, actually seeing and feeling how things work.  What better way to teach about Simple Machines such as pulleys, levers, gears, wheels and axles than to experiment and build with working parts?

2. Duplo Wild Animals

Duplo Wild Animals

The Wild Animals Set is also absolutely fabulous for combining language and science in a uniquely special way.  Children can build different habitats while cooperating with others and having a tremendous amount of fun at the same time.  I know it's a big investment, but this product will last forever.  I have worked with Duplo products and the kids can't break them because it's hard plastic.

3. Measuring Motors

Measuring Motors

A friend bought me Measuring Motors for my birthday and I can't wait to use it in kindergarten this year.  Measuring toys are so hard to find.  This one is so kid-friendly!  It's rubber cars in three different lengths (small, medium and large) with tracks.  Children can place different combinations of cars on the tracks to see how many 1-inch cars it takes to fill the track, how many 2-inch cars it takes, and how many 3-inch cars - or a combination of them.  I like this toy because it shows the children that there's more than one way to arrive at an answer to a problem.  I hate it when students are not allowed to find different solutions to problems.  The cars also come in different colors so they can additionally be used for sorting and patterning.  This is such a multi-purpose tool for mathematics!

4. King School Books

King School Books

These King School books are simply phenomenal.  The books portray friendly, multicultural kids in a kindergarten or first grade setting, depending on the reading level of your students.  Another great thing about these books is that the characters repeat throughout the stories.  So your children are so excited to see Derek or Jasmin in their kindergarten classroom, and then later as they progress in reading they can see those same characters in first grade.  The topics the author chose to write about are things that kindergarten and first grade children actually experience.  If you buy the set, it also comes with a teacher manual, a poster and storage bins.

I'm very curious to know how many of you use Duplo or Lego in your classroom, and what you use.  Please leave a comment below.  I would greatly appreciate it!

Amazing Area

"Bigger, Better, Best" by Stuart Murphy

The book Bigger, Better, Best by Stuart Murphy is an absolute treasure for K and up.  It's a great way to integrate math, reading and social studies.  The book is about siblings who bicker over everything.  When they move into a new house, they debate about whose room is bigger.  Their parents provide them with papers so they can measure for themselves the windows and floors.  This book is an excellent springboard for talking about area.  The book is also funny and, to be quite honest, portrays children in a realistic manner.      I read a review on Amazon that criticized the story because the children do not get along.  Ok, let's be honest.  Anyone out there who has siblings close in age can tell you that you love each other, but you don't get along perfectly.  I also like this book for that reason.  You can talk about how Jenny and Jeff are driving their younger sister, Jill, crazy.

We measured the windows in our classroom, as well as our blackboard, with paper squares.  My kindergarten students were really excited about measuring everything in the classroom.  I designed this sheet to use with Starburst candies so I could assess how the children were doing with this concept.  I love using manipulatives.  Also, because the Starbursts were wrapped, it was very hygienic and I let each child keep a few to eat after they did their problem-solving activities.  You can also have the children estimate before they actually put the Starbursts down.  I did have to remind my kindergarten students that it doesn't matter if their estimation is correct.  I think sometimes they just have this innate desire to be right.
Area With Starbursts

I have searched for songs on this topic.  The two that I found are "Boogie Woogie Measurement" and "Perimeter, Area, Volume" by Learning Math By Song.  "Boogie Woogie Measurement" is very jazzy and is probably suited for 1st and 2nd grade more than K.  "Perimeter, Area, Volume" is a clapping song and can be used for kindergarten but again is a little bit higher - maybe 1st or 2nd grade would be more appropriate.

If any of you have great ideas for area, I would absolutely love to hear about them!

Simple and Sweet Birthday Ideas

"The Secret Birthday Message" by Eric Carle

Yesterday was my birthday and I started thinking about all the things I've done in past years to teach pre-k and kindergarten students about when their birthdays are and how people in America and various other cultures celebrate their birthdays.  This is the first of a series of posts that I will be writing about birthdays.

The Secret Birthday Message by Eric Carle is really special because it has that treasure-hunt-type feel to it.  Students have to look at shape clues to predict where the boy will go in the story to find his birthday surprise.  This book covers concepts such as shape identification, direction words and sequencing, and you could extend it to talk about map skills.  I really enjoy having my children guess what each shape represents in the real world.  Since we're always being told to include higher-level thinking for our pre-k and kindergarten kids, I think this is an excellent way to do it.

Throughout the year in pre-k I use the song "Happy Birthday Letters" by Dr. Jean.  I use the following book with the song, and my kids really focus on every single page.

Happy Birthday Letters

Another thing I do to work on one-to-one correspondence and number identification is to put straight candles and numeral candles in Play Doh Center so that children can put them in sculpted cakes.  It's easy, fun, and the students are learning how to match quantities with numerals.

In kindergarten, I use these birthday cakes with candles to teach months of the year, spelling, fine motor skills, and name writing.  Students write their names somewhere on the cake, cut out the appropriate number of candles, and glue them onto the cake.  You can use chalk, markers, crayons, paint, etc. to decorate these cakes.  I've also used sequins, foam shapes, and little paper flowers.  I always make a pre-made list to tell me whose birthdays are in which month.

Birthday Cakes and Candles 2

After we finish the cakes, there's a great song by Jack Hartmann called "Birthdays" where the children stand up and sit down when they hear their birthday month.  I've noticed that this song really helps children with focusing problems, because they have to listen to stand up for their birthday month.

For many years, I celebrated my birthday with the children and taught them traditions from around the world.  Here's one of my favorites:

Canada:  At birthday parties they serve homemade birthday cakes decorated with colored sugar sprinkles. Between the layers of the cake a wrapped coin might be found. Whomever finds it is the first to get a turn at all the party games. At the parties children receive colorful party favors called crackers. These are tubes wrapped in crepe paper. They pop when you pull a paper strip. Inside there is a small prize, your fortune or a hat.


I would really love to hear special birthday traditions or celebration ideas from you.  Please leave me a comment!

Jelly Bean Giveaways

As I started collecting materials for the beginning of spring, I realized that I have many sweet activities for jelly beans.  First, why not make sure that your students can recognize their color words by using this simple but effective jelly bean coloring sheet?
Coloring Jelly Beans 2

For a math lesson, you could sort, count and graph, either by making a real graph or this bar graph:
Graph Jelly Beans Bar

For small group reading, I made two different books for my high group and for my on-grade level group when I was in kindergarten.  I hope you enjoy these books that reinforce K sight words.  I made both of these as half-size books - I printed each book on three pieces of paper front and back, stapled them along the mid-line, then folded them.
Here Are Jelly Beans
Do You Like Jelly Beans

These pattern strips can be used in a small-group math lesson or in centers (if you trust your students with real jelly beans).  I prefer to do it in a small group and give each child their own Ziploc bag filled with jelly beans.

Pattern Jelly Bean Strips

If you like these activities, please let me know by leaving a comment below.  I'd really like to share activities that are useful to all my sweet friends out there!